MEMPHIS, Tenn. — Two of America’s most violent cities, Memphis and Detroit, have more in common than many in Memphis might care to admit.
Wednesday, Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland and an economist spoke with law students about ways to prevent Memphis from experiencing even more financial problems and possibly becoming the next Detroit.
“It all revolves around population loss,” Strickland said.
That is a problem that experts said also plagued Detroit, leading up to the Motor City’s bankruptcy filing in 2013.
A conservative group at the University of Memphis Law School heard from an economist from a conservative think tank in Washington, D.C. Wednesday about what caused Detroit’s issues.
“This is what happened in Detroit. It taxed and regulated too much. It drove its most productive people and businesses away. The auto industry, for instance, mostly moved away,” said Heritage Foundation Research Fellow Curtis Dubay.
Dubay and Strickland discussed ways Memphis can avoid winding up in a similar economic position as Detroit.
Dubay said that from a conservative tax perspective, Memphis is in a good spot.
“The good news is Memphis is well-situated, because Tennessee doesn’t have an income tax. It has a good tax system,” Dubay said.
He said FedEx’s presence here is attractive to other businesses.
Strickland said tax breaks called PILOTs help keep Memphis competitive.
“The myth that’s around that we lose money on PILOTs is a myth, because we’re getting more tax dollars from that piece of property than we were receiving before we gave the tax break,” Strickland said.
Still, Memphis has other major problems affecting livability.
“We have to immediately address our issues: crime, blight, trash. Make Memphis more attractive for people to move in, so it’s a real top priority,” Strickland said.
The mayor also added that Memphis cannot hide behind annexation.
“We have to stop the loss of population. We have about 650,000 people now. We’ve covered up our population loss over the years through annexation laws. Annexation’s over, so now, if we lose 50,000 people over the next decade, like we did between 2000-2010, it’ll be a real loss. We can’t annex and cover that up,” he said.
Strickland told WREG after the event, he believes Memphis does have a slightly higher property tax rate than some of Memphis’ sister cities, but he does not expect that to change in the near future.
